“Oh?” he said, his voice brimming with both contempt and pity.
“You know what,” I snapped, glad we were out of earshot of others, “just go away. I’m not in the mood to deal with your shit. I just wanna sit here and listen.”
But he didn’t move; he just stood there. Ignoring him, I went back to lounging under the stars on a lovely summer night.
“What do you like about him?” he asked softly.
“Are we gonna have an actual conversation?” I asked pointedly, because I was not going to even wade in if he wasn’t going to try.
“I will attempt it,” he replied, smiling almost sheepishly. “It’s not always easy with you.”
“Same,” I agreed.
He exhaled deeply.
“Okay, then,” I answered, like he hadn’t been an ass just a bit ago, “I like the way the strings of the guitar squeak.”
“Really?”
I grunted.
“I pegged you for a metalhead.”
“Sure,” I agreed, looking up at him. “Now and then.”
“Hard rock?”
“Everything sometimes, right? You need it all.”
“Rap?”
“Yes.”
“Classic R and B, and jazz?”
I shot him a look like he was stupid.
“Okay, okay,” he said, chuckling, taking a seat on the chaise near my knees. “But this, just the guitar…I’m surprised you—I don’t think I’ve ever seen you smile so…I didn’t know you could even look like that.”
“Like what?”
“Unguarded,” he murmured, glancing away, and then dragged his gaze back to me. “You seem to have a special fondness for the guitar.”
“I do,” I said with a sigh, and took a chance and told him something real. “It reminds me of my mom, of growing up with her. She was only seventeen when she had me.”
The way he looked at me, how soft his eyes were, how warm, nearly took my breath away. His longing, not for me but for a mother, was palpable. “You grew up together.”
I nodded. “With her eclectic, sometimes bad, and mostly seventies music.”
“Sixties too?”
“From my grandparents, who were big hippies,” I said, drawing out the “big” part. “You think you smoked a lot of weed.” I arched an eyebrow in emphasis.
He laughed. “God, I love that,” he admitted in a whisper, like his voice dropped out for a moment.
I couldn’t help talking. I wanted us to be friendly, not necessarily friends, but for there to be communication and ease and trust. It would make my job so much easier, and he would recover that much faster. “My mother too, lots of weed. Some now but not as much. People call her a free spirit, and she is, but she’s just her. Just gentle and easy and kind.”
He looked stunned.
“What?”
Gesturing at me, he snorted. “You’re just so…rigid. You’re all about rules. You’re one of the most inflexible people I’ve ever met.”
“To make a new habit, you have to adhere to it,” I explained, not wanting to break the mood but needing him to hear me. “You need healthy habits. You need structure. If I can’t provide you with what you need, what good am I?”
He sighed deeply, glancing away. “I don’t want to disappoint you.”
Clearly, he was not happy with me knowing that. “Hey.”
His eyes were back on me instantly. “The only way you disappoint me is if you don’t try, and you’ve been working your ass off.”
“It’s not that hard to get healthy,” he scoffed.
“Oh no?”
He tipped his head like, perhaps.
“And what do you mean I’m inflexible?” I groused at him. “I’m the king of flexible.”
He lifted his head, searching the sky.
“What’re you—”
“When the lightning bolt kills you dead, I want to make sure to get out of the way.”
“Listen, smartass, I’m a fuckin’ delight. Ask anybody.”
“Is that right?”
“Yeah, sure. You can call the guys I work with.”
His laughter was so good to hear. “Normally,” he began, his voice suddenly husky with welling emotion, “those tree trunk arms of yours would be crossed, along with you looking at me like I’m an idiot. Like, how can I walk and breathe at the same time.”
I made the effort to do neither, but I had to stop myself.
He snorted. “That’s your default everything, annoyed and irritated.”
“Well, maybe you shouldn’t annoy and irritate me.”
“I think the whole world—with the exception of your mother, it sounds like—just pisses you off.”
I couldn’t stop the scowl that time.
He chuckled again, amused at my expense.
“Why don’t you go and mingle while I sit here quietly,” I suggested, his attention starting to make me fidgety, and I wasn’t sure why.
“I’ve mingled,” he said, turning on the chaise, bending his knee, pressing it to the side of my left thigh, wedging it there, his arm braced on the other side of my thighs so that I was caged. If I wanted to get up, he would have to move. “And why are you trying to get rid of me?”
“Because you hate me,” I replied with a shrug.
“I don’t,” he said under his breath.
“I’m sorry?”
He growled. “I said I don’t hate you.”